Rowena Mason writes about energy for the Daily and Sunday Telegraph. Contact her at rowena.mason@telegraph.co.uk.

ITV to scale back its online operations

It looks like ITV's online operations will be taking a hit as part of its plans to cut 600 more jobs.

The broadcaster will be looking to scale back, sell or shut down its ITV Play gambling and games website, its ITV Local regional news website and the ITV Mobile video and news clip service.

We already know that 150 jobs will be going in Leeds, with production of The Royal and Heartbeat halted for up to two years, while social networking website Friends Reunited is up for sale. But I'm hearing that the bulk of the other cuts will be among senior managers and staff working for ITV's non-core websites – Local, Mobile and Play.

Losses across the online operations grew to Â£20m from Â£12m last year, despite unique user visits at ITV.com rising 30pc. Online revenues from ITV.com rose 64pc to Â£18m, but this is only a tiny proportion of the broadcaster's overall Â£2bn income.

Now sources have confirmed that budgets will be more tightly focused around the main ITV.com website, while investment in Local, Mobile and Play is scaled back or stopped altogether.